According to Osho, poetry is the mind—the living bridge between science (the body) and religion (the soul). Through art, music, and beauty the heart becomes refined, preparing consciousness to cross from facts to the ultimate. Religion without poetry turns dry and partial; true spirituality includes rasa, song, and celebration. Science, poetry, and religion should move together for a complete human life.
Poetry softens and opens your heart so you can cross from facts to the soul.
From the Discourses
Passages where Osho speaks to this question — each links to the complete discourse.
Osho, in this age of science it is said that poetry is counting its last days. But seeing the Ganges of poetry that flows through your discourses, it seems you are set on reviving poetry along with religion. Would you kindly tell us whether religion, poetry, and science can walk together?
For example, there is ecstasy in a person. You weigh him and ecstasy has no weight. The person’s weight will show on the scale. Today the person is ecstatic—still the weight will be the same; tomorrow he is unhappy—still the weight will be the same. So the scale will say ecstasy and sorrow do not exist, because they have no weight. Whether there is poetry in a person’s life or not, the weight will be the same. The scale will not distinguish between a man and a monkey. The scale knows only one thing: weight. Science has the scale; it is very gross. With it, some things simply slip away. You can weigh a flower, but how will you weigh the beauty of a flower? To see that beauty a sensitive heart is needed. It is not weighed on a scale; it is weighed on the heart. It is not…
What is a poet? What is poetry?
The scientist is approaching reality as a male mind. It is the masculine approach: conquer nature. And the poet approaches reality with the feminine mind: surrender, be receptive, open up to reality, be in a letgo, relax. Religion is neither male nor female; it is just a witnessing of both. But the scientist is very far away from religion; the poet is a little closer. That's why I sometimes talk about poetry and the poet, because before you can become transcendental you will have to learn how to be poetic. Science is taught by the society, by the school, the college and the university. Poetry is missing. Because it has no market value, nobody cares about it. If you have a poetic approach, your approach is so private it can't be used by the society. And in fact you may be a little problematic to the society, because you will…
Poetry has its roots in the earth and its branches in the sky; it bridges science and religion. Those who miss the world of poetry remain unbridged, remain in a kind of split. And when I use the word 'poetry' it not only includes poetry, it includes all that is poetic: music, dance, sculpture, painting. Painting is poetry with colour. Dance is poetry with body gestures. Music is poetry with sound, just as poetry is poetry with words. Poetry is all-inclusive. It is equivalent to the world of aesthetics, beauty. This has been one of the most dangerous things that happened in the past, that religion became unpoetic, and the same fallacy is being repeated by modern science: modern science is also very unpoetic. And if religion is unpoetic and science is unpoetic then there can be no bridge between these two.
Ninagawa-shinzaemon, a linked-verse poet, and devotee of zen, desired to become a disciple of the remarkable master, ikkyu, who was abbot of the daitokuji in murasakino -- a violet field.
HE CALLED UPON IKKYU, AND THE FOLLOWING DIALOGUE TOOK PLACE AT THE TEMPLE ENTRANCE. IKKYU: WHO ARE YOU? NINAGAWA: A DEVOTEE OF BUDDHISM. IKKYU: YOU ARE FROM? NINAGAWA: YOUR REGION. IKKYU: AH. AND WHAT'S HAPPENING THERE THESE DAYS? NINAGAWA: THE CROWS CAW, THE SPARROWS TWITTER. IKKYU: AND WHERE DO YOU THINK YOU ARE NOW? NINAGAWA: IN A FIELD DYED DEEP VIOLET. IKKYU: WHY? NINAGAWA: MISCANTHUS, MORNING GLORIES, SAFFLOWERS, CHRYSANTHEMUMS, ASTERS. IKKYU: AND AFTER THEY'RE GONE? NINAGAWA: IT IS MIYAGINO -- THE FIELD OF AUTUMN FLOWERING. IKKYU: WHAT HAPPENS IN THAT FIELD? NINAGAWA: THE STREAM FLOWS THROUGH, THE WIND SWEEPS OVER. AMAZED AT NINAGAWA'S ZEN-LIKE SPEECH, IKKYU LED HIM TO HIS ROOM AND SERVED HIM TEA. THEN HE SPOKE THIS IMPROMPTU VERSE: I WANT TO SERVE YOU DELICACIES. ALAS! THE ZEN SECT CAN OFFER NOTHING. AT WHICH THE VISITOR REPLIED: THE MIND WHICH TREATS ME TO NOTHING IS THE ORIGINAL VOID…
Osho, you say the same thing in countless ways. But when I listen to you, it feels as if I am hearing it for the first time. And I feel so much joy that I don’t feel like going back home. What should I do—what can I do—so that I can just keep listening to you!
You will feel as if you have been made to rise out of season, before time—as if you were not yet to go and yet had to go. And if you go in that way, your home will become even more desolate than before. I do not want to make your home desolate; I want to make your home a temple. I want that when you go home, your home’s new form is revealed. I do not want to tear you away from home, from the world, from family life. That is the newness of my sannyas: I do not want to sever you from the world; I want to join you to the world in such a way that your connection with the world becomes a connection with the Divine. Let the world no longer be a barrier between you and the Divine; let it become a means. If…